Spore Series | Book 4 | Exist

by Soward, Kenny

  Bishop, Salina, Kansas

  The Stryker rumbled toward Salina as evening pressed in. He stared out the smallish portal, watching spore tendrils curl in the mist, illuminated by the vehicle’s stark headlamps.

  “It’s creepy out there,” Trevor said where he worked the cameras in his usual seat.

  “Mm hm,” Bishop agreed, gripping the wheel as he navigated the town’s main highway.

  Their mission was simple. They were to check on the children living inside the school building and ensure they were safe. From there, they would determine the best course of action.

  He and Kim leaned toward transporting the kids to Yellow Springs, despite the risks of such a long journey. From Ohio, they could move them to General Miller’s camp where they’d receive proper care and protection.

  Bishop peered through the smallish window, eyes squinting out at the haze of rain and spore dispersion. There was no doubt the moisture had rejuvenated the fungus, even if temporarily.

  Like before, they’d left Kim and Riley in the bus to stay safe and guard their temporary home. His wife continued to work feverishly to produce more of the serum in case any of the children needed it.

  While Kim had always been a hard worker, the presence of the children drove her energy to insane levels. She attacked the problem with more vigor, requesting Bishop, and even Riley, give a little blood to the cause.

  Jake and Saylor sat in the Stryker’s crew quarters, dressed in their protective gear. It was their second trip in the vehicle, but the younger boy looked around the space with wonder. He gaped at the instrument panels, rifle racks, and turret with its .50 caliber gun. Jake acted cool, trying not to be impressed with the awesome machine. But he gripped the arm of his seat as if reveling in the perfect rumble of noise.

  Bishop understood their emotions. He’d felt the same way the first time he’d started it up. He figured it was every child’s dream to ride in an official military vehicle, and he didn’t hide his grin of satisfaction.

  “We’re coming up on the barrier,” Trevor announced. The boy had become a wizard at working the cameras, easily shifting from one side of the armored truck to the other, switching between light modes with the flick of a button.

  “I see it,” Bishop said. The line of cars appeared in his headlamps, the old repair shop sitting off to the side.

  He turned the wheel to the right, angling the vehicle around the building, past the campfire, and into a side yard. A wooden fence reared up in the headlamps, and Bishop hit the brake, stopping them cold.

  They sat for a moment before Trevor made a disgruntled sound. “What are you waiting for? Run it over.”

  “Sorry, son. Old habits die hard, I guess.” Bishop chuckled dry. “Respect for property and all that.”

  “It’s the end of the world. No one cares about property.”

  “Right.”

  Bishop pushed the Stryker forward and smashed over the wooden fence with a crack and splinter of wood. The sounds broke through the cabin speakers in sharp, high-fidelity.

  “Smash,” Saylor chuckled, staring at Trevor’s camera display from his seat.

  They trundled through the wet yard, churning up mud and grass and fungus, before crushing another fence, this time chain link. Bishop angled the Stryker toward the street again. They knocked aside a parked car before he straightened and continued south into town.

  A cluster of inky spore tendrils drifted in front of them, looking like the fingers of death. The vehicle broke them apart only to have them coagulate and reform behind them.

  The rain, spore clouds, and mist painted a surreal scene, something from a creepy, hellish nightmare. A fearful shudder ran across Bishop’s shoulders, and he was thankful to be safe inside the armored vehicle.

  “The school is coming up soon,” Jake said. He unbuckled himself and came to stand behind Bishop.

  Bishop glanced back at the boy, giving him a fatherly nod. “I’m really impressed with how you kids made it this far.”

  Jake shrugged, and his voice held a hint of maturity that went well beyond his years. “We did our best. Tried to look after the little ones. Probably got lucky a lot.”

  Bishop nodded, his eyes stung with tears.

  They passed through the rest of town wordlessly. Quaint houses sat dark and quiet in the gloom. Lumps of what had once been human beings lay scattered in the streets. There were only a few car crashes, fewer signs of desperation than he’d witnessed in Ft. Collins. Salina might have once been a sleepy town, but it had officially been put to rest. Permanently and forever.

  Ashes to fungus, Bishop thought with a shake of his head.

  “There it is,” Jake announced, pointing to a large, shadowy building coming up on their right.

  Bishop craned his neck to peer up at the three-story structure. One section rose another two stories above the rest.

  “I can show you the way down,” the boy said. “Just pull into the lot by that side door. It’s the one we always use.”

  Bishop nodded and turned the Stryker into the lot, knocking over parking signs as he went. He pulled straight through the yard and up to the entrance. Leaving the engine running, he unbuckled himself and stood.

  He turned to Trevor. “Same routine as always. Shut the door behind us. Keep an eye out. Let us know if you see any of the Ugly Eight.”

  “No problem,” the boy nodded and gave his father a thumbs up.

  Bishop unbuckled Saylor, grabbed his weapons, and walked to the rear of the vehicle. Trevor engaged the back door, and with the high whine of gears, the drawbridge-like portal swung down.

  He hopped out and turned to make sure the kids exited behind him. He watched the door shut, then his eyes sifted to the Stryker’s external cameras. They were sprinkled with spores, rain, and mud.

  “Do you want me to wipe off your cameras, Son?”

  “I’ll do it. They’re self-cleaning.”

  Bishop watched as one of the camera bubbles sunk into a tight ring of rubber that acted as a squeegee. It stripped away the muck and let it fall to the ground. The bubble paused inside the Stryker’s carapace for a moment, making a whizzing noise before slowly extending again, perfectly clean.

  “That was pretty cool,” Bishop said, impressed.

  He nodded for Jake to take the lead, and the boy jogged over to a short stone stairwell and climbed to the top. Saylor skipped up behind him, and Bishop followed at a slower pace.

  The older boy pushed open the door to a screech of metal, and the three entered. A dark hall stretched ahead of them, so pitch black he couldn’t see two feet in any direction.

  Bishop flipped on his rifle light and shined it down the passage of tiled floors and closed lockers.

  “Are you getting this, hon?”

  “I see everything.” Kim’s voice filtered through his tiny earpiece.

  Trevor had affixed a remote camera to Bishop’s air filtration mask. It provided her a direct feed when he roamed outside the Stryker.

  “Okay, kids. Let’s go.”

  Jake led the way down the hall to a wide stairwell that broke off in both directions. On their left, it descended to the school’s entrance. On the right, it plunged deeper into the bowels of the building. The older boy took the latter path, and they moved downstairs with the echo of their boots on the tiles.

  Looking up, Bishop noticed spots of Asphyxia on the walls that looked like drips of decay leaking down. The moisture had given the fungus new life, producing a crimson luminance like he’d first seen on the Colorado State University grounds.

  It was reborn into the stuff that had choked and killed thousands of people right before his eyes. The stuff that had almost driven the Shields family to early graves.

  Once on the lower floor, Bishop noticed the hallway was thinner and painted a dull gray color. The fungus was less prevalent, gripping the stairwell archway but not reaching very far across the tiles.

  “This way,” Jake said, and he gestured for them to follow. Saylor traipsed behi
nd him, tracing his fingers along the wall like it was a walk through Wonderland.

  Bishop kept his rifle pointed away from the boys, but it produced enough light to stretch their shadows long. The sounds of their clomping boots echoed eerily, so he broke the silence.

  “I assume there weren’t many in the school when the spores hit?”

  Jake shook his head. “Like I said, it was just the wood shop crew and the football players outside.”

  “What happened to them?” he asked. “The football players. Are they still...” He let his words trail off. He’d meant to say, “out there,” but he didn’t want to make the kids relive any terrible memories.

  “Did you see that old bonfire out at the edge of town?” Jake responded. “We put them in there.”

  Bishop recalled the charred mannequin shapes haphazardly tossed into the pile of glowing soot and ash. He remembered thinking it didn’t look like the work of a professional, and he’d done enough research in his life to know burning flesh and bone was no easy task.

  “Oh, dear Lord.” Kim whispered.

  “That must have been difficult.” Bishop swallowed dry. Talking about it didn’t seem to bother the boy, at least not on the outside.

  “We didn’t want to leave them out on the field,” Jake explained. “We tried burying them, but it was too hard. Then Saylor remembered his aunt was cremated a long time ago.”

  “So, you thought that was best for the team?”

  “Yep. For moms and dads, too.” The boy quickly added, reaching the end of the hall. “Don’t worry, we prayed over them.”

  “Those poor kids,” Kim said, and he imagined her sitting at her desk on the bus with a shocked expression on her face.

  “How did you do it?” Bishop asked, genuinely curious. “I mean, how did you move all the... the, um, football players and moms and dads?”

  “We used my dad’s truck. At least until the Ugly Eight heard us. Then we had to ride our bikes.”

  “Well, I’m sure they would all appreciate what you did.” Bishop tried to sound positive, but his stomach sunk at the thought of kids dragging corpses into a truck, driving them to the construction field, and burning them.

  At the end of the hall, Jake pushed through another door to reveal a narrower stairwell leading down.

  “This goes to the boiler room,” he said, and his eyes flicked up to Bishop. “The kids are down there.”

  “Okay,” he replied. “Lead on, son.”

  The older boy paused a minute, as if undecided. Then he released a breath and nodded, gesturing for him to follow. The kids took the stairs two at a time, quickly leaving the range of his rifle light.

  “Hold up.” Bishop halted halfway between two landings. “Hey, I can’t see you.”

  A mysterious silence fell over the place, adding to claustrophobic grip of his face mask. He glanced back up the stairs. It was pitch black, and water dripped from somewhere nearby.

  “Are you okay, Bish?” Kim asked, her voice crackling with disruption.

  “I can barely hear you,” he replied. “Yes, I’m okay, but I think the signal is breaking up.”

  His wife said something else, though it wasn’t clear.

  “Honey? Hey, I’ll talk to you when the signal clears. For now, I’ll keep going.” He chuckled and gave an uncertain head shake. “Hell, I’m the one with the gun.”

  He descended noisily, letting his boots clomp on the tiled stairs, noting the worn edges from years of treading feet. At the bottom was the entrance to another hallway. He stepped forward, about to call for the kids, when a light burst from the passage in front of him.

  Bishop raised his rifle, finger edging toward the trigger. Then he quickly lowered the barrel and relaxed his grip when he saw Jake standing there holding an electric lantern high.

  “That’s a good way to get yourself shot,” Bishop growled, angry at the boy for the first time.

  “Sorry,” Jake replied, sheepishly. “I just wanted to find a better light.”

  “Where’s Saylor?”

  “He went to fetch the others.” The boy grinned. “He wants you to meet them.”

  The boy turned and guided him through a dingy hallway with dull, dirty floors and stained walls. Old pipes extended along the ceiling, dripping and dead.

  It was eerily quiet. He might have expected to hear boiler room hissing or at least the sounds of children laughing and playing.

  “Are we close?” he asked.

  “Just up ahead,” Jake said, and he continued until they reached a plastic barrier hanging in front of them with a slit cut down the center.

  The material dulled the sharpness of Bishop’s rifle light while also casting it in all directions. He couldn’t see what was on the other side, so he stepped to the slit and poked his barrel through. Pulling the plastic aside, he peered in to see the walls covered with sheeting and three sets of buckets and scrubbers resting on the floor.

  “I assume this is your clean room?” He backed out and glanced at the older boy.

  “Yeah. There’s three of them. We figured we should rinse with bleach three times before we can take off our masks. Then we do one more rinse and step into home.”

  “Home?”

  “Where we live,” Jake explained. “Behind the plastic.” The boy grinned again with a mixture of uncertainty and wariness. “We’re all here. Do you want to meet everyone?”

  Bishop inserted his face into the opening and peered across to the next section over. He didn’t see any kids standing on the other side, but he imagined tiny hands pressing against the sheet, moving slowly as they waved up and down at him.

  When he blinked, no one was there.

  “I don’t see anyone. Do the kids exit from here, too?”

  “There’s another way out on the other side,” Jake replied. “It circles around and comes out behind us.”

  “Wait. Behind us?” Bishop retreated from the slit and flashed Jake a dark scowl. But the boy wasn’t looking at him. He was staring back down the hallway at something else.

  A weight gripped his chest and sunk into his stomach. There were no sounds. No footsteps. No breathing. Not even the high-pitch of a child’s voice.

  His feet were mired in quicksand, heavy and slow. The rifle weighed a thousand pounds. Fear hollowed out a section of his chest and settled there, laughing at him with a hyena’s high cackle.

  Bishop set his jaw and redoubled his grip on his gun. With a Herculean effort, he forced his body to spin and lock this new enemy in his sights.

  *

  His rifle barrel ticked back and forth, fixing on one smallish figure after the other. He counted six, ten, twenty of them or more standing in the hall. His finger flexed on the trigger, twitching, shivering from panic driven by terror.

  Bishop wasn’t easily frightened, but somehow he’d let the creepy, dingy basement hallways fill him with an unnatural fear. It had gotten the best of him, and he shook his head with shame as he jerked his hand away from the trigger.

  They were just kids.

  A gaggle of girls and boys stood in front of him. They wore jeans and hoodies and dresses, torn to better fit them, taped to their legs and arms so no spores could get in. The littlest girl he saw couldn’t have been more than ten years old. She wore a Kansas Jayhawk jersey, and her gas mask dwarfed her tiny face.

  Another boy stood behind her, holding an electric lantern. He was dressed in a superhero shirt two sizes too big for him, and his dark eyes stared at Bishop with childlike innocence from his shiny visor.

  At first glance, it looked like something out of a horror movie. Children of the Corn or the Village of the Damned. But a longer look told a different story. Their eyes weren't glowing, and they didn’t have claws and fangs. They were destitute kids surviving in a new and hostile world.

  “Are you seeing this, Kim?” Bishop asked, hoping their connection had smoothed out.

  “I see them,” she replied. “We’ve got to do something for them, Bish.”

  “I
know,” he whispered the words. “But where to start?”

  Jake stepped past Bishop and stood in front of the children. He held his lantern up higher and gestured. “This is the guy we were telling you about.”

  “Is he one of the Ugly?” the Jayhawk jersey girl asked.

  “He’s not,” Saylor piped up. “He’s not one of them. Came from somewhere else.”

  Jake continued. “They took us inside their bus. It’s super cool in there. They’ve got DVDs and games, too. We could go home with them...”

  “You should check out their living conditions,” Kim said, her voice tinged with urgency. “Gather up anything they need and bring them back to the bus. We can--”

  “One second, babe,” Bishop interrupted her, keeping his voice low. He’d been watching the kids as they continued their exchange, all turned away from him as they talked.

  “What do you mean, one second?” Kim’s anger was evident in her thickening Kentucky accent. “Gather them up, put them in the Stryker, and get your butts out of there.”

  Bishop’s eyes moved between Jake and Saylor and the little girl who’d first spoken. “It’s not up to us.” A sideways grin formed on his face. “I think they’re discussing it. I think I’ll have to convince them to come.”

  Kim’s silence on the other end told him he was about to get a verbal lashing, so he jumped ahead of her before she let loose.

  “They’ve been out here for weeks,” he explained. “They haven’t had supervision, or parents, and they’re doing fine. They even managed to hide from a group of other adults who meant them harm. The Ugly Eight scared them into hiding, right? Why would we be any better?”

  “Oh,” Kim said softly as the bigger picture arrived in her head. Her tone changed. “Can you talk to them?”

  “I’m going to try.”

  Bishop strung the rifle over his shoulder and stepped forward. He held his hands up to quiet the kids. Their conversation died down, and all eyes turned to him.

  “Look. We don’t mean you any harm. We’re not like the Ugly Eight at all.” He kept his tone soft, hoping his resonant voice sounded soothing. “If you come back with us, we can protect you. Maybe you could even go home with us. There’s a camp in Washington with more people and kids like you.”